ha ha!! i just re-read my post!!
no no, i didn't mean that, you daft old coot!! what i meant to say, in my typically mangled fashion, was that i agree with your comments regarding "accept that the alternative is that there is no alternative and no need for an alternative...."
in other words, what you write is a good way of looking at things; i MYSELF am looking too hard for answers and that applying that approach is quite sensible and reasonable!!! i rather stupidly linked that together and it came out in a Tower Of Babble!! i told you i write as thoughts enter the brain!!!!
i never thought chinese whispers translated to the written form!! ha ha!!
my apologies, CB, i quite royally fucked my response, Sir!
(although i was tempted to remove that line and then castigate you for making shit up about me ha ha!!! we should've started a surreal feud where i finished the argument with that immortal showstopper, "thats what Hitler would've said!").

don't you dare turn bland on me or i'll come round to your abode with some sand for the vaseline!

thank you CB.
i know i let my own confusion and disappointment spill over into incoherency. i try to type as feelings enter my mind which results in a jumble of fragments a lot of the time.
i suppose it was one of the reasons why i thought better of it the first time i posted the videos; am i just contributing to criticism when i could've posted a more deeper, compassionate, emotional video? (unfortunately, some of the ones i'd like to have shared, i can't embed, including three wonderful documentaries: "We Were Here: The AIDS Years In San Francisco", "Baka: A Cry From The Rainforest" and "The Interrupters" about intervention in gang violence in amongst the youth of Chicago).
maybe i'm frustrated sometimes that some who have such a sharp intelligence only use it for commentating instead of making a larger difference. but maybe that is THEIR reason for being here; to make others aware and point out wrongdoing. to get others to at least think and begin to question.
i do believe that if the Church really spoke from the heart and laid themselves bare; if they apologised for some of these terrible crimes that have been perpetrated in their name, then a greater spiritual revolution and evolution would arrive.
maybe this is pie in the sky. i suppose i should leave that behind too and just concentrate on looking forward, not backward. maybe it's just that sense of injustice that rankles so.
i think that while i was heartened and appreciative when Fry & Hitchen said what they said, i was also slightly disappointed that they didn't engage in other ways of moving forward. but, as you wrote, maybe i'm too busy myself looking for answers instead of simply floating in this incredible pool of life as we know it and letting the current carry me wherever i'm supposed to go.
i feel rather stupid now actually. but hey ho.
i always regret starting these things, as i always feel i should've used my time more wisely. a rather unfortunate habit of riling against the world's ills, pissing in the wind and then explaining what i should've done instead.
i get upset at the suffering some have to endure too easily i suppose. powerless in a way to help but feeling the hurt on their behalf so strongly.
maybe there's an envy of others with a strong faith; to question so pointedly but offer no relief. hurt but feel helpless. maybe a self-imposed flagellation of some kind.
but i do care, that's what i want to get across.
fuck me, it's Therapy Thursday!! what a tremendous cock, eh?!! i need some light-hearted relief! comedy to the rescue and viewings of Michael Palin and Bruce Parry, i feel.
my apologies everyone!! how embarrassing....

Actually I find the Hitchens' rant you posted not one of his best moments ...impressive and shocking in its way, but rather one dimensional too. Have you read his book 'God is not Great'; it is a much more balanced account, full of polemic (his dismantling of the mother Theresa myth is masterful), but also very witty, erudite and actually full of humanity too.

You ask what alternative Hitchens offers. Well the trick is to accept that the alternative is that there is no alternative and no need for an alternative. We are what we are, here and now, we come from nothing and we go to nothing and if we all spent more effort making the most of that amazing situation we find ourselves in, the world would likely be a better place. Actually, for me at least, it is a form of letting go and liberation that perhaps a Buddhist would recognise (an irony that I am sure did not escape Mr Hitchens).

In God Is Not Great he explains his vision

'Above all, we are in need of a renewed Enlightenment, which will base itself on the proposition that the proper study of mankind is man and woman [referencing Alexander Pope]. This Enlightenment will not need to depend, like its predecessors, on the heroic breakthroughs of a few gifted and exceptionally courageous people. It is within the compass of the average person. The study of literature and poetry, both for its own sake and for the eternal ethical questions with which it deals, can now easily depose the scrutiny of sacred texts that have been found to be corrupt and confected. The pursuit of unfettered scientific inquiry, and the availability of new findings to masses of people by electronic means, will revolutionize our concepts of research and development. Very importantly, the divorce between the sexual life and fear, and the sexual life and disease, and the sexual life and tyranny, can now at last be attempted, on the sole condition that we banish all religions from the discourse. And all this and more is, for the first time in our history, within the reach if not the grasp of everyone.'

a further musing, if i may...
i'd be interested to hear from fellow Hitch admirers, their opinion on this trend of condemnation and negative association as opposed to offering alternatives and a dedication to them.
there seems in my mind, an almost pathological obsession with nay-saying and critique; these issues must be addressed of course, but why relegate one's self to a sideline of commentary rather than pro-activity?
i greatly admire Hitchens on many levels, and Stephen Fry's comments are also close to my heart. but, like Zappa was wont to do, it seems that a constant, almost obsessive buffeting of where others are going wrong; an intellectual wallowing in quicksand, that ultimately, offers forth no possible road map to a more agreeable state, is the preferred option.
wouldn't time have been better spent positing a more agreeable course?
this may well read like a mighty contradiction, and a frankly hypocritical idea from someone who has ranted and rained down scorn in the past; i hold up my hands. but, by passionately arguing for the removal of religious intrusion into the lives of the nonplussed, surely a debate equivalent to a literary roundabout is the only outcome.
why not concentrate on something positive? why not dedicate one's life to a "better choice"?
handsomely paid intellectual discussion, the equivalent of a Linus blanket; an enveloping warmth of fire-side safety-chat that is a lot easier to indulge in than a hoisting of the sleeves. the comfortable refuge of the "educated"?
i'm not sure.
i AM a fan. but i get tired of the apparent absolving of the commentator. a verbal jerk-off.
maybe i commit the same "crime". maybe it's all healthy. maybe i'm still wrestling.
anyone the patience to comment out there?

i take my bows, TL!!! you're very kind!
i do think the points raised in the speeches are incredibly pertinent; they are things that must be addressed, i feel, by anyone claiming to be a "Catholic".
i believe that many people would be horrified if it was their boss or mother or father that behaved in a particular way and spoke loudly and with self-justification and took it upon themselves to claim they were speaking on your behalf; people wouldn't stand for it and rightly so.
but it seems that the Church, as an organisation, is allowed to behave in this manner. how come? that isn't a self-righteous remark, it's what happens, isn't it?

i do believe that any religion should have the same warnings and restrictions that hallucinogenic plants endure. and natural let us not forget, these are NATURAL plants; if everything on earth was placed here by God, then they were put here for a reason also.
both are dangerous, both can be abused, both can lead to enlightenment and comfort and safety and compassion and love. but they are the same.
a quick mention of Terence McKenna's wonderful "Food Of The God's" book is important here.

me personally? i'm only interested in whether people are Kynd or not. that is only what concerns me. i don't lay the blame for systematic torture, abuse and death at the feet of every Christian folk. something as futile and pathetic as treating every German as a fully paid up member of the nazi party and complicit in the holocaust. utter nonsense i think you'd agree.

i encourage as many world views and opinions and beliefs and faiths as possible. none of us know what the answers are. so it means we're the same. i hope both sides of the argument take note.

and yes, Mr. Pid, a topic for philosophical discussion would be a good addition.
possible suggestions for a title could be:

however, contrary to posts that've been misinterpreted before, this video (in my opinion) is not intended to denounce religion or claim there is no God.
i do believe there is a God, but not necessarily in the popular form so worshipped today.
there is no doubt that many working in various religions around the world are selfless, honest and do more for humankind that either i, or very possibly, you, the good people on the forums.
i do feel that if the Catholic Church were to really listen to what Mr. Fry & Mr. Hitchens had to say, and offer the kind of apologies that we would be so quick to give, then the world would be a better place.
this is in no way intended to poke fun or belittle people's faith. these videos deal with facts that desperately need addressing. i think any moral, right-minded person would agree.
i'm not an atheist and never will be. i'm not an "anything".

please everyone think clearly before ripping it apart.
i can see no reason why science and spirituality aren't the very best of bedfellows.
let us remember that by only focusing on "intelligence" , one can be just as guilty and blinkered as another party.

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